Coming soon: 839 new FM radio stations

As many as 839 more FM radio stations, especially for smaller towns and cities, would be in the offing by the year-end. Chetan Chauhan reports.

Updated on: Mar 8, 2013, 01:26:58 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

As many as 839 more FM radio stations, especially for smaller towns and cities, would be in the offing by the year-end.

A ministerial panel on Wednesday approved the auction of licences for the third phase of FM (frequency modulation) radio channels for which the information and broadcasting ministry will set guidelines soon.

Around 86 Indian cities have FM radio stations and the government aims to extend the entertainment facility to most of towns having population of one lakh.

An empowered group of ministers headed by finance minister P Chidambaram had asked the telecom minister to release additional frequency to I&B ministry to allow auction, through which the government aims to raise R5,000 crore.

The government had earned about Rs 1,700 crore through earlier two phases of auction. For phase-III, the government is hopeful of a rich haul because of the popularity of the FM radio stations.

I&B secretary Uday Kumar Varma said that the ministerial panel had cleared the proposal and sought some changes in request for proposal to be sought from private players. "We will issue auction guidelines soon," he said.

Chidambaram in his budget speech had announced FM radio expansion to cover 294 cities. The process for the same was initiated by him through approval of the ministerial panel which rejected the I&B ministry's suggestion to link the licence fee with the percentage of total revenue generated by a FM radio station as is the case with telecom licences.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Catch every big hit, every wicket with Crickit, a one stop destination for Live Scores, Match Stats, Infographics & much more. Explore now!

Stay updated with all top Cities including, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and more across India. Stay informed on the latest happenings in World News along with Delhi Election 2025 and Delhi Election Result 2025 Live, New Delhi Election Result Live, Kalkaji Election Result Live at Hindustan Times.